# Epilogue

Parts one, two, and three were originally pieces of online courses I began to create in January 2020. A friend of mine, who took the first course, self-care, suggested that I should have began the course with this conclusion. My life is transformed. All the skills, tools, and strategies I share are those that I use regularly, or have used but are no longer relevant. The following is the conclusion I wrote in January 2020.

While preparing to publish this first monthly course, I contemplated my own growth.

I haven’t had a depressive episode in longer than I can remember. I can say with confidence that it has been at least two years, maybe even three.

Not only have I not had an episode, I haven’t even felt the familiar tinge of ‘warning’ that I came to know so well. The sensation of the Big Feeling…the dark cloud looming over head, with the storm in the distance…that has taught me, over time, if I engage with it, I loop in to its cycle.

Overwhelm. Powerless. Longing. These feelings show up. I notice them. I name them. I choose to allow the feeling, knowing that by allowing I am releasing the momentum. And as I continue to practice notice.name.allow.release., the intensity lessens.

The feelings are not in charge any more. They may show up, and stay for a bit longer than I care for them to, but underneath the discomfort is a knowing they are passing.

Another nudge that showed up this morning was a reminder of two big ‘aha’s’ that shifted my experience of what I call ‘ordinary day’. The first aha was maybe a little less than five years ago. While in the process of learning, applying, and teaching skills, I realized that there were two people I was allowing a lot of power to trigger BIG emotional responses inside of me. To be clear, it wasn’t the human person, as much as it was the belief I had about the role they represented in my life.

I realized that by giving them this power, I needed them to see me, to really hear me, to fully understand me, and to value my existence. I was spinning in a cycle of emotional unease because the two people I gave this power to, over and over again, were not seeing me for who I knew myself to be. Because they didn’t ‘see’ me, then for sure they didn’t ‘hear’ what I wanted them to hear, and of course if they didn’t see or hear me as I desired, then how could they ‘understand’ and ‘value’ me.

It wasn’t their job to.

When I finally came to this realization, I turned everything toward me. I did two things. I saw myself. I listened to myself with the intent to hear. I connected to, and understood, ME. I valued ME, and began to affirm ME. I then recognized that if I wanted the validation from them, then maybe there were others in my life who wanted, or would appreciate, this validation from me. I began to turn it around and practice seeing others for who they were, to listen with the intent to hear, to try to understand, and to value that they existed.

Shift.

The other big game changer was maybe three summers ago. I had a depressive episode show up. I was enraged. The hateful talk showed up and I finally recognized it, I caught it. I recognized that this was where it could change. I had gone months without an episode, I had made massive growth. It wasn’t about the absence of the depression (depression wasn’t an enemy), it was an understanding. I also learned that when the Big Feelings show up, it’s an opportunity to let them go. To release the power. To comfort and soothe myself by the story I choose to tell. The power, or the momentum, lessens. Eventually there is space. Space to stay in charge. To control how I respond. To fully be aware and to fully choose the path I want to take, recognizing that engaging (in my case, it was abusive, hateful self-talk) was only going to create more of the same.

Can you see the self-care in the shifting, or healing, process? Caring about yourself. Caring about how you feel.

One last thing, I could go on and on about observable and practical, daily practices that have become part of my routine that fit into this ‘self-care’ lens. When I use the term self-care, I am referring to caring about yourself enough to begin a practice of self-awareness that brings you into your body to recognize sensations that are cueing you all the time as to what ‘state’ you are in. What story are you telling about the sensations? You get to tell your own story. The story shifts the state. Intuition and broad view live in the expansive state of wellbeing. Attune yourself to your own guidance. You’ll get it. And when you do, you get to share it with others.